• Complain

Jack Straw - The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain

Here you can read online Jack Straw - The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain full text of the book (entire story) in english for free. Download pdf and epub, get meaning, cover and reviews about this ebook. year: 2019, publisher: Biteback Publishing, genre: Science / Politics. Description of the work, (preface) as well as reviews are available. Best literature library LitArk.com created for fans of good reading and offers a wide selection of genres:

Romance novel Science fiction Adventure Detective Science History Home and family Prose Art Politics Computer Non-fiction Religion Business Children Humor

Choose a favorite category and find really read worthwhile books. Enjoy immersion in the world of imagination, feel the emotions of the characters or learn something new for yourself, make an fascinating discovery.

Jack Straw The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain
  • Book:
    The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain
  • Author:
  • Publisher:
    Biteback Publishing
  • Genre:
  • Year:
    2019
  • Rating:
    5 / 5
  • Favourites:
    Add to favourites
  • Your mark:
    • 100
    • 1
    • 2
    • 3
    • 4
    • 5

The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain: summary, description and annotation

We offer to read an annotation, description, summary or preface (depends on what the author of the book "The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain" wrote himself). If you haven't found the necessary information about the book — write in the comments, we will try to find it.

Amongst British diplomats theres a rather poignant joke that Iran is the only country in the world which still regards the United Kingdom as a super power. But for many Iranians, its not a joke at all. Scratch the surface, and Iranians of all political persuasions will remind you that it was Britain, with the US, who removed the democratically-elected Prime Minister of Iran, Mohammad Mosaddegh. The coup against Mosaddegh may have been in 1953, but for Iranians that feels like yesterday.
Rather as we in the United Kingdom continue to define ourselves by what happened nearly eighty years ago at the start of the Second World War, modern Iranians define themselves by their bloody experience of the Iran Iraq war of 1980 88, where the country had stood alone against Iraq. The conflict was an act of unprovoked aggression by Saddam Hussein, leader of Iraq. The rest of the world France, the Soviet Union, later the US and the UK all piled in to support Iraq, with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf States bankrolling Saddam. It was this experience that has helped define Iran s view of the world, and its attitudes to both its local rivals for power and those further afield.
This book seeks to illuminate Britains difficult relationship with Iran, and in doing so provide anyone with an interest in Iran, with a better understanding of this extraordinary country.

Jack Straw: author's other books


Who wrote The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain? Find out the surname, the name of the author of the book and a list of all author's works by series.

The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

Reset

Interval:

Bookmark:

Make

For decades, British Foreign Secretaries have wrestled with the great challenges of dealing successfully with Iranian leaders. Jack Straw has gone beyond that to develop the rich understanding of the countrys culture, psychology and history revealed in this book. It will be required reading for anyone who wants to understand how to improve relations with Iran in the coming years, and is an accurate record of the attempts many of us have made to do so.

W ILLIAM H AGUE

Jack Straw was in the frontline of negotiations with Iran. This vivid account links his early diplomatic successes on the nuclear file with the harsh reality of the Iranian system. Iran remains a strategic flashpoint, as the Americans replace diplomacy with sanctions. Jacks book is essential reading for those with a thirst for deeper understanding of the Middle Easts most complex and fascinating nation.

S IR J OHN S AWERS, CHIEF OF THE S ECRET I NTELLIGENCE S ERVICE 20092014

A book that is both highly readable and refreshingly personal. Jack Straws analysis of what shaped Irans tangled relations with Britain is lucid; his deep affection for the country shines through; and his first-hand account of the highs and lows of his adventures in Iran, both while British Foreign Secretary and afterwards, makes for a gripping yarn.

B RIDGET K ENDALL, BBC DIPLOMATIC CORRESPONDENT 19982016

Its rare for a Foreign Secretary to become so engrossed in the challenges of dealing with a single country that he decides to write a history of Britains involvement with it. But that is what Jack Straw has done. Cleverly linking his own experiences with the bigger picture, he gives us a splendid, engrossing account of the remarkable relationship that developed over the centuries between Iran and the UK, and ends with some wise advice for both sides on how to move on from the present, seemingly interminable, exchange of recriminations.

S IR P ETER WESTMACOTT, FORMER UK A MBASSADOR TO THE US, F RANCE AND T URKEY

This work scores a rare triumph: it commingles personal, political and historical perspectives to achieve a three-dimensional perspective on problems most observers see in only one dimension.

R ICHARD D ANZIG, 71ST S ECRETARY OF THE US N AVY

Jack Straw had an extraordinary experience when on holiday in Iran. He was handed a document effectively blaming him for more than a century and half of malign British interference in Irans politics. His book examines the main charges, with a mixture of history, wry comment and personal recollections from his five years as UK Foreign Secretary. The book is essential reading for anyone prepared to question the neo-conservative guff that dominates newspaper comment pages, derived as it is from those in the US, Saudi Arabia, the Emirates and Israel who wish Iran ill. The book is insightful and crisply written and I cannot recommend it too highly.

M ICHAEL B URLEIGH, E NGELSBERG C HAIR (LSE IDEAS)

For Jack Straw, Iran started as a matter of public policy and grew into a private passion. In this fascinating book, he combines an exploration of the tortuous history of BritishIranian relations with the insights of the statesman to paint a compelling portrait of a country whose internal contradictions have an importance far beyond its borders.

L ORD R ICKETTS, FORMER HEAD OF THE D IPLOMATIC S ERVICE AND N ATIONAL S ECURITY A DVISER

For William and Charlotte

CONTENTS I ran is too large and too strategically situated to be so - photo 1
CONTENTS

I ran is too large and too strategically situated to be so misunderstood outside its borders, by policy-makers and the public alike. Its population of 80 million is equal to Germanys, well above the UKs. Its hydrocarbon reserves are vast. It is middle income. Its economy, though held back for years by sanctions, is surprisingly resilient and, partly because of sanctions, self-sufficient in many areas.

Iran has had a distinguished history, stretching back three millennia. It has a high culture, whose influence can be seen and felt in India, in Turkey, and on Islam itself. Its connections with European civilisation and Western philosophy are profound. But Iran has suffered grievously in its past from foreign domination, and today craves international respect and recognition.

In a region being torn apart by ethnic and religious strife, Iran appears on the surface to be relatively stable, though there are serious tensions ready to erupt. Whatever fantasies President Trump may have that squeezing Iran will cause the Islamic Republic to crumble, it is nonetheless likely to survive. Iran is hugely influential, for good or ill, in the politics of Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, in Yemen, in many Gulf States, and Afghanistan.

At times since the 1979 Islamic Revolution it has been as brutally repressive in its own way as was the regime of the Shah which it replaced. Yet the constitution of the Islamic Republic provides an arena for intense political argument, which in better periods is larger than many outside might think.

During my time as British Foreign Secretary, I became fascinated, bewitched, infuriated, perplexed by this singular country. I strived to understand it better, and have done ever since. In 2001, I was the first British Foreign Secretary to visit the country after the 1979 Islamic Revolution, and have visited it many times since. I count many Iranians as my friends.

The purpose of this book is to provide some illumination of this country. As I show, Britains entanglement with Iran goes back five centuries far longer than most people may realise. Iran has a powerful sense of exceptionalism, and of its national identity. It is Muslim, but never Arab, Shia not Sunni. And it has the most extraordinary system of government, in which factions as disparate as the Tea Party and Bernie Sanderss left-wing Democrats are in office at the same time.

I have great affection for its people, notwithstanding the unwelcome experiences to which my wife and I, with two close friends, were subject in October 2015.

Jack Straw
June 2019

22 OCTOBER 2015

C ross the dual carriageway at that gap, Mohammed, our interpreter, shouted to the driver, taking instructions from his phone, and pull up behind that white car.

In the dark, we (my wife and I and two friends) saw three large men in plain clothes get out of the white car as we braked behind it. One, shorter, was better-dressed than the other two. He was wearing an immaculately pressed suit, buttoned-up shirt, no tie, and had an enamel insignia in his lapel, with the Iranian emblem on it. He was obviously in charge.

He opened our drivers door and shouted at him in Persian. The blood visibly drained from the drivers face. He was bundled into the back of the unmarked white car. One of the other men got into our drivers seat. Mohammed, who had got out to talk to the other officers, had to scramble back into the people carrier as it was about to drive off.

Our driver had quickly worked out who these men were and knew not to argue. I hoped that they were police officers of some kind, and on our side, but this was far from self-evident. Three decades before, there had been a hard stop in north Tehran on a British diplomat, Edward Chaplin, driving with his wife and young child, with Edward bundled handcuffed and hooded into another car and driven off. I decided not to share this information with the rest of our party. They were already fearing that this was a kidnap.

We sped along the Shiraz ring road again. We had been round and round this road system, which circles the great city, at least three times already and were now very familiar with it. Close to the Botanic Gardens, we abruptly turned into a dimly lit side street to pull up behind another people carrier, identical in make and model to ours. The only differences were that this one had different plates and smoked-glass windows. We were told to be very quick, to transfer all our luggage and ourselves into the new vehicle. A third officer joined us in the back seats, this one carrying an unconcealed pistol.

Next page
Light

Font size:

Reset

Interval:

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain»

Look at similar books to The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.


Reviews about «The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain»

Discussion, reviews of the book The English Job: Understanding Iran and Why It Distrusts Britain and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.